Air Safety in Europe - Constantly maintaining and improving standards

Representing the 36 major network airlines which make up the AEA, Captain de Vries underlined that the exemplary safety record of European airlines was a product of rigorously applied best practice which needed to be maintained and refined within an appropriate regulatory framework.
 
He called for an integrated approach, taking on board all EU aviation stakeholders: airlines, airports, ATC providers, manufacturers and maintenance organisations as well as the regulators.  Such a harmonised approach had been lacking in April 2010 when the volcanic ash contamination led to an unnecessary and prolonged closure of large parts of European airspace, bringing widespread disruption to airlines and their customers and, ironically, causing the postponement of this same safety conference.
 
Europe has a relatively new safety regulator, EASA the European Aviation Safely Agency which has still to convince the airlines that its work is focused squarely on purely safety-related issues.  Captain de Vries called for a common approach to safety based on a single set of safety rules for the EU, compatible with global standards.  New EASA rules should be justified on safety grounds, take into account their impact on operators, and be capable of being assessed after implementation, as to their effectiveness.
 
Part of the AEA presentation dealt with Just Culture, which in the safety field involves a system of incident reporting which could be undertaken in full confidence by operating crew, that they would not face sanctions arising from their reports. This requires finding a balance between blame-free and punitive extremes.  All parties involved in accidents and incidents should be able to speak freely and in confidence.  More action and leadership is required at EU level to ensure national law is amended to enable just culture.  All AEA airlines will support this process, said Bart de Vries.